Would it be possible for you to describe the dough management process once the dough comes out of the mixer bowl? For example, is the dough put in the cooler (e.g., in bulk or individual balls), left at room temperature, or possibly a combination of both? And how is the dough used when you are ready to make skins out of the dough? I assume either screens or disks are used in a conveyor oven and that there is no pre-baking of the dough before adding sauce, cheese and other toppings. The duration and time of bake would also be useful information. Our home mixers, refrigerators, rolling pins, and ovens are no match for the Hobarts, coolers, sheeters and commercial ovens that professional pizza operators use so we have to adapt our equipment and processes as best we can to simulate a commercial environment and the products that come out of that environment.

I'm going to post a drawn-out step by step of the process we used (It will probably include much useles info).You can then read through the process and ask any questions you may have and I'll gladly try to remember the answer.

::::::::::::: The dough :::::::::::::-- The dough is made in the early morning hours using a big 3.5ft tall mixer.-- Unfortunately I don't know what exactly went into the mixer.-- The dough is separated into 50lb portions then sealed into plastic bags and put into the cooler.-- I don't know for sure if the dough was bagged immediately or if it was given some time to rise, but I'm guessing it was bagged immediately.-- The cooler is cold enough that the dough doesn't rise but warm enough that vegetables in there are not damaged.

::::::::::::: Making dough circles for standard pizzas :::::::::::::-- Take a bag of dough out of the cooler, open it and remove amount needed (usually half).-- Spread a decent amount of flour over counter so the dough doesn't stick.-- Set the dough on the counter and flatten it out a bit so it can be put through the rolling machine.-- Spread a little flour over the top of the dough.-- Coat the rolling machine with a bit of flour to prevent sticking.-- Feed the dough through the machine using highest thickness setting (about 1.5in).-- After the dough is fed through the machine, smooth it out with hands, trying to make a fairly smooth rectangular slab, free of pockets and bulges.-- Spread some more flour over top of the dough.-- Put some more flour on the rolling machine.-- Run dough through machine again using a lower thickness setting (about 3/4in).-- We now have a sheet of dough on the table that is about 5ft long, 1ft wide and 3/4in thick.-- Smooth the sheet with hands, getting rid of the pockets/cracks/bulges and maintaining rectangular shape.-- Spread lots of flour evenly over the top of whole sheet then wipe away excess flour.-- Fold the sheet along it's length - from right side to center.-- Spread lots of flour evenly over the top of folded portion, then wipe away excess flour.-- Fold the sheet again - bring the unfolded 1/3 portion over the top of the folded 2/3 portion.-- Spread a light, even coat of flour over the top of the length of dough.-- Flatten out the length of dough a bit, starting from the center and working out toward the ends (until dough length is about 1in thinner).-- Trim about two inches off each end to keep the ends neat.-- Flip the length of dough over and spread a light, even coat of flour on the bottom side then flip the dough back over.-- Make sure the length of dough is free of cracks, pockets and bulges.-- Run the dough through the machine using the highest thickness setting again (about 1.5in).-- Run it through again using the lower thickness setting (about 3/4in).-- Put some more flour on machine.-- Run it through again using a lower thickness setting (about 3/8in).-- This time, as the dough is coming out of machine, fold it into a stack ('Z' style), applying plenty of flour as we go to keep it from sticking to itself.-- Run the dough through again using a lower thickness setting (about 3/16in).-- As the dough is coming out of the machine, fold it into a stack again (apply flour as before but not quite as much).-- More flour on the machine.-- Run the dough through again using an even lower thickness setting (about 1/8in).-- As the dough is coming out of machine, fold it into a stack again (no flour needed).-- We now have a long sheet of 1/8in thick dough folded into a stack that is about 9in high and a couple inches wider than a large pizza.-- Put some more flour on the counter.-- Set the stack near the right side of the counter.-- Carefully unfold the stack across the counter until we run out of counter space.-- Cut the unfolded portion away from the stack.-- Dock the sheet using a 8in docker.-- We now have a sheet with a bunch of holes in it (holes that almost go all the way through)-- Get as many circles out of the sheet as possible using a pizza-sized metal ring cutter/guide (and knife if needed)-- Take one of the circles and fold it in half, so that the top of the circle becomes the outside of the half-circle.-- Now fold the half-circle in half so that we have a quarter-circle.-- Weigh it.-- If it weighs too much set it off to the side to go through machine again.-- If it weighs far too little, throw it in scrap bin (for later use).-- If it weighs the proper amount or a tad too little, use it.-- Take out a metal pizza tray and lay a square piece of pizza-sized wax paper on the tray.-- Put the quarter-circle on the wax paper and fold it back out into a circle (making sure the outside becomes the side facing up again).-- Repeat processes til we have a stack of about 8 dough circles on the tray (each one separated by wax paper).-- Seal the stack in a plastic bag then put it on a rack in the cooler.-- Keep making stacks until the sheet is used up.-- Throw leftover scraps into scrap bin.

::::::::::::: Making dough balls for pan pizzas :::::::::::::-- Take a bag of dough out of the cooler, open it and remove amount needed (usually half).-- Cut the slab of dough into several smaller slabs (number of smaller slabs depends on size of balls being made).-- Spread a lot of flour over a small area of the counter.-- Lay one of the smaller slabs on the flour (the slab should be somewhat square shaped).-- Fold all four corners of the slab towards the center of the slab.-- All corners should meet at the center and enough pressure should have been applied by fingers to have created an indention at the center.-- Now, instead of a square slab, we have what looks a bit like a mushroom cap.-- Pick up the dough then slap it back on the counter with the folds facing down.-- We now have what looks like a ball with a flat spot on the bottom.-- We may need to round it a bit with our hands to give it more of a ball shape.-- Continue until dough is used up and you have several balls.-- Place a sheet of wax paper on a metal tray then put the balls on the wax paper (flat side down)-- Seal the tray of balls in a plastic bag then put them on a rack in the cooler.-- For a large pan pizza the dough balls are about 6in in diameter.-- For a medium, about 4in.-- For a small, about 2in.

::::::::::::: Making bases for pan pizzas :::::::::::::-- Take a tray of dough balls out of the cooler.-- Dump quite a bit of flower in a pile on the counter.-- Take a dough ball and smash it into the flour then flip it over and smash it in again then set it off to the side.-- Repeat with all the balls.-- Take a smashed ball and run it through the rolling machine on 3/4in setting.-- We now have an elongated piece of dough.-- Coat the machine with some flour to prevent sticking.-- Run the elongated piece of dough through the machine lengthwise on 1/2in setting.-- Run it through lengthwise again on 3/8in setting.-- Now run it through again but sideways this time on 1/8in setting.-- We now have a 1/8in thick circular piece of dough that is about the same size as the pan we're going to use.-- Now take out a pan .. the pan looks like a 1in deep cake pan with holes drilled in the bottom.-- Now take out the cooking spray and spray the inside of the pan with a pretty thick, even coat.-- Lay the circular piece of dough evenly over the top of the pan then mold it into the inside of the pan.-- The dough should cover the bottom and the inside edges of the pan evenly.-- At the top, the dough should also be flush with the lip of the pan's edge.-- Seal the pan in a plastic bag then put it in the cooler.-- Repeat until all balls have been used up.

::::::::::::: Making a pan pizza :::::::::::::-- Take a pan pizza base out of the cooler.-- Set it someplace warm .. usually about 8ft from the oven.-- Let the pan sit 45-55 minutes to let the dough rise then bring the pan over to the counter to make pizza.-- Add sauce, cheese and toppings same as with standard pizza.-- Put the pizza through the oven (on the slower pan pizza conveyer).-- As the pizza is coming out of the oven, peel an edge up with your fingers so that you can get the corner of the peel underneath.-- Put pizza on wax paper sheet on counter.-- Cut pizza using rocker style cutter.-- Slide peel under the wax paper then slide pizza onto a serving plate or into a delivery/carryout box (wax paper stays with the pizza on serving plate but not in box).

::::::::::::: Making a standard pizza :::::::::::::-- Bring a stack of dough circles out of the main cooler and put it in the cooler under the counter for easy access.-- Put a pizza disc on the counter - The discs are just thin, flat pieces of metal with a bunch of holes drilled through it.-- Take out a dough circle and put it on the disc.-- Evenly brush a fairly thin layer of sauce onto circle to within about 1in of the edge of the dough.-- Add cheese - the cheese is a mixture of orange cheese and white cheese (probably some type of cheddar and some type of mozzarella)-- Weigh cheese first in bucket - I can't remember the weight of the cheese but the weighing bucket was about 7in tall and 7in in diameter and was filled a little over half way.-- Put the pizza through the oven.-- Scoop the pizza off the disc using peel.-- Put pizza on wax paper sheet on counter.-- Cut pizza using rocker style cutter.-- Slide peel under the wax paper then slide pizza onto a serving plate or into a delivery/carryout box (wax paper stays with the pizza on serving plate but not in box).

::::::::::::: The oven :::::::::::::-- The oven is a huge conveyer oven that moves a great deal of hot air over the pizzas to cook them.-- It has three conveyers and each one moves at different speeds.-- The top conveyer is for pan pizza, the center is for regular pizza and the bottom is for twists.-- We set an uncooked standard pizza on it's conveyer and about 2-4 minutes later it comes out the other side fully cooked.-- On a slow day, a standard pizza takes about 4 minutes to go through the oven and a pan pizza takes about 8 minutes.-- On a busy day, the oven settings are adjusted and a standard takes about 2 minutes and a pan takes about 5 minutes.-- We visually monitor the pizza as it's coming out of the oven .. if the toppings still look too raw or if the cheese isn't melted enough, we slide the pizza back in a bit so that it can cook longer.-- Pan pizzas often need to be pushed back in a bit because of not being cooked enough.-- As pizzas are going through the oven, we use a long poker to pop any large bubbles that may form.

::::::::::::: Notes :::::::::::::The area in which we work with the dough is well air conditioned.The cool air keeps the dough from rising much while we are working with it, but it does still rise some.

Often we will bring more than one bag of dough out of the cooler at a time. We will work on one bag while the other bag sits on a counter waiting for it's turn. While the other bag is sitting, the dough will rise inside the bag quite a bit. The rising of the dough in the other bag has little, or no, affect on the finished product .. the pizzas come out about the same. Recently it was decided that the dough in the other bag is easier to work with and can produce slightly better crust. We started putting the other bag near the oven so that the warmth will cause the dough to rise even more.

Can't remember the brand of cooking spray they used .. it was in a blue can.

Thank you very much. That was a wonderful elaboration of the processes used to make the different types of pizzas.

I have a few questions that should tighten up my understanding of the processes.

1) When the dough goes into the cooler after coming out of the mixer is it intended that the dough be used the same day or can it stay in the cooler, in bulk, overnight? If same day, how long does the dough usually stay in the cooler before being taken out to make the dough circles? If for next day use, how long does the dough remain in the cooler before being taken out to make the dough circles? Once the dough circles are prepared and put into the cooler, how long can they remain there before using?

2) You indicated that when the dough circles have been cut out of the docked sheet they are folded in quarters and weighed. Since the standard pizzas presumably come in different sizes, can you tell us what weights correspond to the different pizza sizes? I assume they are all 1/8-inch thick.

3) Does the docker have metal or plastic pins?

4) Are all the standard pizzas baked on discs of one size or is there a disc size that corresponds to each size pizza?

5) Can you describe the discs a bit further? That is, do the discs have a lot of big holes or a lot of small holes, spaced close together or far apart, etc.? Are the discs standard items or are they obtained from the manufacturer of the conveyor and intended to be used by that model of conveyor? If a standard item, do you know the manufacturer of the discs?

6) Do you know what brand/model of conveyor oven is used (e.g., Lincoln, Middlby-Marshall, Wolf, Star, etc.)? From your description, it sounds like the oven is an impingement type oven, not an infrared (like a Q-Matic).

4) The discs are specific to the particular pizza(i.e. there are 5 different sizes)5) The discs are very thin metal with relatively large holes in them. They are used so often they actually get pretty warped.

A couple more pix:A couple bags of dough asking me to take them home(sadly I did not)(http://www.zackuribe.com/Doughbag.jpg)

A BAD picture of the "pizza cutters" used to form dough from the sheeter. You can actually see some skins on discs in the holder behind them(the top one is actually a little warped).(http://www.zackuribe.com/PizzaCutter.jpg)

1) Generally, a bag of dough is meant to be used within 2 days of being made.On average a bag will stay in the cooler for 8-12 hours before being used (during slow periods a bag could end up staying in longer).There is usually at least twelve 50lb bags of dough in the cooler at all times.Each bag has a time and date written on it so that we can make sure we're always pulling the oldest bag from the cooler.Dough circles are used the same day they are made.There will often be several hundred dough circles in the cooler waiting to be made into pizzas.Any circles that haven't been used by the end of the day get thrown in the scrap bin.At the end of the day, all the scraps in the scrap bin are put through the rolling machine to make one big sheet of dough.The sheet of dough is then rolled up like a giant fruit roll-up then bagged, labeled and put in the cooler to be used the next day.The dough, the dough circles and the dough balls can all be used immediately after being made .. they don't have to sit in the cooler.

2) I can't be certain about the weights of the dough .. I can only make best guesses.Here's what I remember:Large standard : 12.5 ozLarge pan: 16.5 oz (pretty sure about this one)Med pan: 12.5 ozSmall pan: 8.5 ozYep, they are all 1/8in thick.

3) The dockers had metal pins.Above, I posted that a 8in docker is used .. that is incorrect .. I changed that to 5in but it somehow ended up 8in again.Some 8in dockers are there but they are never used .. only 5in.This appears to be the exact docker used:http://www.bigtray.com/skuimg/AMEDD5704_b.jpg

4) The pan pizzas have different sized discs.The standard pizzas are all cooked one size disc (the size of the large pizza).

6) Can't remember the brand/model.The thing is huge.I did quite a bit of web searching looking for something similar but nothing I've found comes even close in size.I will search some more though.If you know of a site that sells such large ovens, post a link and I'll pick out the one that's most similar.

An interesting detail about pan pizza bases:About 70 bases are taken out of the cooler in the morning and set out to rise.As mentioned, the bases must be allowed to sit and rise for about 45-55 minutes before being used to make a pan pizza.What's interesting is that they can be left out much, much longer and still be used.They can actually sit out from early morning til late at night and still be used to make a pan pizza.The dough will have risen quite a bit but it's still usable and, in my opinion, makes a better pan pizza.If a risen pan pizza base does not get used by closing time, it must be thrown in the trash.

zappcatt,Unfortunately, all I know is that (judging by the smell and taste) they use plenty of black pepper.

You've been very generous and helpful with your replies already. However, you might help me with a few more questions.

1) When I recently visited the RT website, I saw five pizza sizes on the menu. The menu didn't differentiate between pizza types (e.g., standard versus pan). What I saw were the following sizes: 6.5" (personal), 9.5" (small), 12" (medium), 14" (large) and 15" (extra large). Are these generic sizes for both the standard pizzas and the pan pizzas? When you mentioned that the dough for a large standard was 12.5 ounces, was this for the 14" or the 15" pizza? Do you remember the dough weights for the other standard dough circles?

2) You indicated that the standard pizzas are all baked on the large disc. Is that a 14" disc or a 15" disc? I would have thought that the standard pizzas would be baked on corresponding size discs so that they bake up uniformly. In this context, I would think that a 6.5" would bake up differently on a 15" disc than a 15" would on the 15" disc. I know that you might be able to compensate for the differences by pushing the not-quite-finished pizzas back into the conveyor, but wasn't sure that is what you actually do.

3) Given that the pan pizzas are baked in their own (perforated) pans, is there a reason why they are baked on discs (of corresponding size)? Is that to keep the crusts from baking and browning too fast on the bottom or is there a more logical reason?

4) Is the docking done as a matter of showmanship or is it necessary, especially for dough circles that have not had much fermentation or for dough circles that have to be baked while they may still be cold, as when you are being slammed?

FYI, the RT website I visited says that the cheese is a blend of cheddar, whole-milk mozzarella and provolone. The sauce includes 11 different herbs and spices.

I did a search for pizza conveyor ovens and found this site that seems to offer several, both new and used: http://www.pizzaovens.com/Buyers/Buy.asp. I used the search engine at the bottom of the page to pull up the different models. It's possible that RT has something more elaborate than the ovens shown at the pizzaovens.com site.

1) At this particular round table they only offer three sizes for standard .. small, medium and large.For pan pizzas they have personal, small, medium and large.They don't offer extra large for standard or pan.The small, medium and large standard pizzas are about the same diameter as the small, medium and large pan pizzas.The 12.5 oz weight is for the large - 14"Unfortunately I am still unable to remember the dough weights for the small and medium dough circles.

2) The standard pizzas are all cooked on a 14" disc.All sizes seem to cook up just fine on that disk without needing to be put back in.If a pizza needs to be put back in it's usually because someone had placed the pizza too far forward on the conveyer.

3) The pan pizzas aren't put on disks .. they are run through the oven in just the pans that they were made in.

4) Docking was originally done just to help prevent bubbles from forming while baking.At this point I would imagine that docking has become a pretty essential step in yielding a proper round table pizza.I say this because all the product testing, procedure building and detailed calibrations have been performed using docked dough.

Thank you for the info on the cheese and sauce.I never heard anyone say what types of cheese were being used .. surprisingly, it just never came up.

I think I have the full picture now. Thank you very much for your help.

Using the 12.5 ounce dough ball weight you mentioned for a 14-inch standard pizza, I calculate that the thickness factor is 0.08. That's higher than the thickness factor (0.05) I previously calculated for the DKM thin-crust pizza. It is also higher than the thickness factor (0.05) I used to come up with a "test" dough recipe that I set forth in Part 2 of elsegundo's RT trilogy. If 0.08 is the correct thickness factor, I calculate that the corresponding dough weight for the 9.5" (small) would be 5.75 ounces, and the corresponding dough weight for the 12" (medium) would be 9.2 ounces. Do these numbers sound right? If so, I can go back to my spreadsheet to come up with a new "test" dough recipe--maybe for a 15-inch or 16-inch dough weight from which a 14-inch dough circle would be cut.

I did a little homework on the discs and on the pizza rings. Pizzatools (one of whose discs you provided a link to) has a 14" disc that has 546 holes and sells for $15.70 for the version with the PSTK coating and for $9.28 for the non-PSTK version. American Metalcraft (AM) also has a line of highly perforated discs, including one with a rim that permits using a rolling pin to cut the dough, much like a cutter pan, I suppose. Pizzatools also sells dough rings, and for the 14" dough ring, the price is $39.51.

As you may know, some jurisdictions do not allow pizza operators to use screens anymore for health reasons (according to pizzatools, Dallas is one of them), so many users have gone to discs (or possibly perforated cutter pans). I assume that a 14-inch screen should work, however, without the need to pre-bake the crust before saucing and dressing. I obviously don't need the dough ring, since I can use the 14-inch screen to lay out a 14-inch dough circle. I will soon have a docker, and I have a rolling pin. I also have a 14-inch cutter pan (not perforated) which I may be able to use also, but doing so may require some pre-baking of the crust before saucing and dressing. At least I have several options available to me to play around with. For dough mixing/knkeading purposes, I am thinking of using a food processor because I think it may do a better job than my KitchenAid stand mixer.

The baked thick-crust pizza is fairly dense with a dry-crunchy (not crisp) outer crust with ity-bity white blisters that has no or minimal oven browning (most browning that exists is primarily on the underside). Don't know how soon I can get pics.Other browning occurs from meat oils and scorched cheese or sauce and some blackening from poorly cleaned screens.

The deep-dish/thick crust pizzas are placed back onto the conveyor for a second run and is checked visually thru the front window that conveniently opens so that the crust bottoms can be checked or for pop-ing bubbles. The pizza could be removed thru this window, most employees find using the rake to slide the pizza thru much easier.

To my knowledge, our Round Tables have always used screens not discs, for both crust types. At least that's what "they" call them. They are more like the flat pans with 3/8" holes.

Interesting how the standard proceedures vary.

« Last Edit: October 13, 2005, 07:43:13 PM by Lydia »

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The roundest knight at King Arthur's round table was Sir Cumference.They say he acquired his size from eating too much pi.

It's not a problem. As I thought about dough weights, it occurred to me that the weight of the dough coming out of the mixer will increase some anyway due to the use of a lot of bench flour being worked into the dough. I have adjusted my recipe to produce enough dough to make a 14-inch dough circle, so I should be OK. You also gave me a key data point--the 1/8" dough thickness. As long as I can get that thickness uniformly, I should be able to weigh the dough circle after it has been made and get a good idea as to thickness factor and be able to estimate the weights for the other sizes. That information will also allow me to tweak the recipe to be able to get closer to the required dough amount to make any of the possible sizes.

My plan of action is to use my food processor to make the dough, as Steve did quite successfully with the DKM dough. I will then refrigerate the dough for 8-12 hours and roll it out (using a rolling pin) along the lines you described. I will dock the dough (with my new docker) before cutting out a 14-inch dough circle. I may use a 14-inch screen (it's all I have at the moment) in combination with a preheated stone as added insurance just in case I need the stone to get better bottom browning and better crispiness. I do not plan to pre-bake the dough circle, at least not this time. I'd like to see if I can bake the pizza as it would be done at RT. I don't recall if you mentioned the temperature of the RT conveyor oven, but I am thinking of using around 475 degrees F.

This is a tale of two pizzas—my first serious attempts to make cracker-type crust pizzas. For these pizzas, I used the formulation I put together recently in an attempt to replicate the Round Table dough/crust. First, the formulation I used:

There were both similarities and differences between the two doughs I made based on the above formulation and their management. In terms of similarities, the quantities of ingredients were selected to produce enough dough in each case to produce a 14-inch dough circle, with a bit of dough left over. I wanted to be sure that there would be enough dough to fit on a 14-inch pizza screen and have a thickness of 1/8-inch, the size and thickness ThatOneGuy specified for a Round Table “large” standard pizza. To establish the requisite amount of dough, I used the weight given by ThatOneGuy for a 14-inch dough circle, 12.50 oz., and calculated that the corresponding thickness factor (TF) was 0.08. I used that thickness factor to calculate an amount of dough sufficient to make a 15-inch dough circle. The 1-inch difference would be the leftover dough (scrap).

The water that I used for both doughs was temperature adjusted to achieve a finished dough temperature of around 80 degrees F, which is apparently an objective used by RT. I used part of this water to reconstitute the Carnation non-fat dry milk and to disable any offending protein or enzyme that might negatively affect the dough. To do this, I combined part of the water with the dry milk and heated it to just below boiling, then let it cool down, and combined it with the rest of the water, which was then cooled to the temperature I calculated would be necessary to achieve the finished dough temperature of around 80 degrees F.

Both doughs were processed using a food processor. I simply combined all of the ingredients except for the water/milk mixture in the food processor, slowly added the water/milk mixture, and pulsed for about 40-50 seconds, or until the ingredients took on a cornmeal-like texture. I then gathered the dough and shaped it into a round ball. This is the technique that Steve used with very good results in making the DKM thin-crust dough. In both cases, the finished dough temperature was close to 80 degrees F.

The major ingredient difference between the two doughs was that I used bread flour (2 c. + 1 T. + 2 t.) for the first dough (which I will hereafter refer to as RT1) and King Arthur Sir Lancelot high-gluten flour (2 c. + 2 T. + 2 t.) for the second dough (RT2). I wanted to compare the use of the bread flour and KASL high-gluten flour since Steve and others had indicated a preference for the high-gluten flour for a cracker-type crust.

I used two diametrically different approaches to the dough management for the RT1 and RT2 doughs. The RT1 dough was refrigerated for about 12 hours. It was then rolled out into a large circle from which I cut out a dough circle of 14 inches, trying to simulate in a general way the process described by ThatOneGuy. I found this to be a challenge for the small amount of dough I had to work with. However, I was able easily to roll out the dough and cut out a 14-inch dough circle from the rolled out dough. The 14-inch dough circle had a 1/8-inch thickness. And its weight, at around 12.4 oz., was reasonably close to the 12.5 oz. mentioned by ThatOneGuy.

I docked the dough circle, put it on the 14-inch pizza screen, dressed it in the usual fashion, and put it in a 500 degree F preheated oven, in which I had also placed a pizza stone on the lowest oven rack position and preheated for about an hour. The pizza was baked (on the middle oven rack position) for about 4 minutes, following which I transferred the pizza to the stone for additional bottom browning of the crust. There were no bubbles formed at any time during the process.

By contrast, for the RT2 dough, I left it to ferment entirely at room temperature, for about 24 hours. This is the approach that Steve has used with good results. Unlike the RT1 dough, which did not rise noticeably during its 12-hours of fermentation in the refrigerator, the RT2 dough rose by about 25 percent, with most of the rise occurring during the first few hours. To roll out and shape the RT2 dough, I used a technique suggested by Tom Lehmann. I rolled the RT2 dough out to a large circle, folded it in quarters, and re-rolled it again, this time to around 15 inches. This is a technique that many of our members use in making deep-dish doughs. I then cut out a 14-inch dough circle, docked it on both sides, placed it in a 14-inch dark cutter pan, and pre-baked the dough for about 4 minutes in a 500 degree F preheated oven. There were many small to medium sized bubbles this time. I removed the pre-baked crust from the oven, dressed it in the usual fashion, and finished baking it at around 475 degrees F for another 5 or 6 minutes, or until the crust was browned and the cheeses were bubbling and just starting to turn brown.

The photos in this post are for the pizza made using the RT1 dough. The photos in the next post are for the pizza made using the RT2 dough. As between the two pizzas, the RT2 pizza was clearly better. The overall flavors were comparable for the most part, but what made the RT2 pizza better for me was that it was far crispier and much more cracker-like than the RT1 pizza. The RT2 crust also had better browning and flavor. Whether the differences were due mainly to the flours used, the dough rolling techniques, or the lack of a pre-bake for the RT1 dough, I don’t yet know, but the RT1 pizza was more chewy than cracker-like. In retrospect, I might have baked the RT1 pizza directly on the preheated pizza stone, as Tom Lehmann frequently recommends for a thin, cracker-type crust (he also recommends overnight cold fermentation of the dough). I might try that approach another time.

Another possibility is to bake the pizza on a perforated cutter pan or disk (neither of which I have at the moment), with or without a pre-bake. I am also inclined to lower the hydration ratio by a few percent for future RT doughs since a drier dough seems more likely to produce a more cracker-like crust. I’m fairly confident that from what I have already learned I will be able to improve upon my results.

Since I have never had a Round Table pizza, someone else who has eaten Round Table’s standard pizza will have to try the formulation specified above to tell us whether I came anywhere close to the RT dough/pizza.